UCLA Community College Review: reverse transfer and multiple missions of community colleges.

A growing number of students, called reverse transfer students, attend community colleges at the same time they are enrolled at a four-year institution or after they earn a bachelor's degree. This article explains the motivations and effects of reverse transfer on both students and institutions, and it discusses the potentially positive consequences of reverse transfer in relation to community colleges' multiple missions. Future empirical analyses of the efficiency and equity effects of reverse transfer are critical for developing effective institutional interventions and helping state policymakers to design more coordinated higher education systems that enhance student and institutional performance.

**********

Community colleges enroll many different types of non-traditional students; one such group consists of reverse transfer students. Reverse transfer refers to a particular college attendance pattern "whereby students matriculate at a four-year college and transfer to a two-year school" (Townsend, 1999, p. 1). Given that a significant proportion of undergraduate students move back and forth between four- and two-year institutions, it is useful to investigate the origin and social impact of this trend. One issue is that reverse transfer creates an effect in which more educationally privileged students crowd out those for whom the community college is the only option (Winter & Harris, 2000). Such an effect could increase the inequality in resource allocation within community colleges and threaten these institutions' "democratic mission" to serve the most disadvantaged populations (Brint & Karabel, 1989).

Do reverse transfers crowd out the less-qualified potential students? A few studies of this effect have been conducted at the institutional level (Winter & Harris, 2000; McHugh, 2003). However, Phelan (1999) notices that most states lack "a complete and clear understanding of the nature, behaviors, and motivations of reverse transfer students" (p. 79), which would greatly impact our understanding of the effects of reverse transfer on other college students. This lack of knowledge is not surprising because researchers have not yet built a satisfactory analytical framework to understand reverse transfer that links institutional change with student interest.

This article applies organizational theory about the multiple missions of community colleges to explain the occurrence and effects of reverse transfer on both students and institutions and to offer a counter perspective to more or less negative interpretations of the phenomenon. Here, organizational theory is useful in two respects. First, it hypothesizes a correlation between the mission expansion of two-year colleges and reverse transfer. Studying reverse transfer from the perspective of organizational theory thus provides an opportunity to understand the effects of the dynamic evolution of two-year college missions on students and institutions (Bailey & Averianova, 1998). Second, organizational theory enables us to pinpoint potentially positive consequences of reverse transfer in relation to community colleges' multiple missions. With such knowledge, policymakers and college administrators can improve the way they recruit and retain transfer students, align two-year and four-year college curricula and pedagogy, and adjust performance measures for public two-year institutions (Phelan, 1999; Townsend & Dever, 1999; Townsend, 2001b). Overall, both positive and negative potential effects of reverse transfer have to be studied in order to understand the complexity of this phenomenon.

Definition and Scope of Reverse Transfer

A growing number of students attend community colleges at the same time they are enrolled at a four-year institution or after they earn a bachelor's degree. Following Townsend and Dever's (1999) terminology, these students are commonly referred to as undergraduate or temporary reverse transfer students and post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students, respectively. Undergraduate reverse transfer students are those four-year college students who transfer to two-year colleges to obtain a degree or a certificate then transfer back to their original institutions. Those who are primarily enrolled in a four-year college but earn a few credits at a community college during the summer or academic year are called temporary reverse transfer students. Post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students already hold a bachelor's or other advanced degree and take community college courses for personal development or career advancement. Many of them enroll in non-credit contract training programs, continuing education programs, or other community service projects. They are "reverse transfer students" only in the sense that they attend a community college after attending a four-year institution, the loosest definition of reverse transfer.

The scope of reverse transfer varies by the unit of analysis. Based on single-institutional data, the proportion of a community college student body comprised of undergraduate reverse transfer students varies from 10% to 20%. At the state level, the percentage of undergraduate reverse transfer students equals roughly 13% to 15% of the two-year college student population, although estimates vary significantly across states (Townsend & Dever, 1999). Townsend and Dever (1999) cited previous studies by the American Association of Community Colleges showing that, in the 1990s, post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students accounted for 10% to 20% of the entire national two-year college population. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972, Tinto (1987) reported that 4% of all students who began at a four-year college transferred to a two-year institution. Among four-year students who started college in fall 1989, roughly 12% transferred to two-year institutions within 6 years (McCormick & Carroll, 1997). Recently, Adelman, Daniel, and Berkovits (2003) measured the extent to which four-year students temporarily transferred to a community college and found that 28 % of four-year students earned nine or more credits at two-year colleges during summers. Over the past 20 years, more and more bachelor's degree holders have attended two-year colleges.

The statistical snapshot offered here demonstrates that reverse transfer students have reached significant numbers in two-year institutions. Their presence rekindles public interest in the evolution of community colleges and their missions and the effect this evolution has on individual educational attainment. To understand these effects, however, one needs to analyze the links between the institutional mission, the operational environment, and changing student demands.

Multiple Missions of the Community College

In an analysis of challenges facing community colleges in the 21st century, Bailey (2002) observed that most public two-year institutions are aggressively expanding their missions by developing their non-credit and continuing education programs. Recent case studies support his observation. As Bailey and Morest (2004) write, "The list of community college missions now goes well beyond the core degree-granting programs that either lead to transfer or a terminal occupational degree or certificate" (p. 2). Although opponents of this mission expansion criticize two-year institutions for trying to provide something for everyone, colleges continue to pursue a comprehensive strategy rather than specialize in a narrowly defined area.

Bailey and Morest (2004) divide the missions of community colleges into three primary categories: core, vertical, and horizontal activities. The core mission includes providing degree-granting programs that lead to an associate degree or vocational certificate, as well as those required for transfer to four-year institutions. Vertical expansion extends colleges' connections downward to high schools and upward to four-year colleges and universities. These two missions do not appear to conflict with one another; recruiting new students from a more diversified population, for example, does not preclude the offering of core academic programs. This is not the case for horizontal expansion, however, which diversifies a college's market niche and revenue streams by offering new services. Typical examples of horizontal expansion include providing contract training for companies, continuing education classes, welfare programs, and small business incubation centers. Horizontal expansion allows community colleges to reach new students and carry out new business but may reduce the emphasis on core programs.

The question is how to achieve an optimal mix of functions. The general principle, according to Bailey and Averianova (1998), is that horizontally expanded missions must be functionally associated with colleges' core services but that colleges can provide these services more efficiently than any other organization. They argue that "successful efforts at expanding missions will probably be built on complementarities or economies of scope between core college functions--teaching academic and vocational courses--and other activities" (p. 23).

Because of the principle of complementarities--wherein newly added functions enhance college teaching and student learning without costing more or diverting institutional resources from core services--vertical expansion might improve organizational efficiency (Bailey & Morest, 2004). Thus new students recruited through vertical expansion overwhelmingly enroll in credit programs, strengthening two-year colleges' transfer function and improving the use of college facilities and human resources. Horizontal expansion programs rarely overlap with core services (Bailey, 2002; Bailey & Morest, 2004), revealing that the principle of complementarities does not apply. Indeed, there are distinct divisions between core and horizontally expanded missions in terms of faculty, administration, students, and facilities. For instance, many community colleges provide the same courses in degree programs as they do in contract training or adult literacy programs, but each division offers a separate course taught by different faculty members (Grubb, 1999).

Unfortunately, no study has empirically tested the effects of multiple missions on overall resource allocation in community colleges. Even in the limited areas in which the three missions integrate with each other, it is not clear to what extent they improve student achievement or institutional efficiency. Nevertheless, the literature on multiple missions suggests important implications of a study of reverse transfer students, which I will discuss further in the sections below. First, however, I will explore students' various motivations leading to reverse transfer.

Motivations for Reverse Transfer

Undergraduate students transfer from four-year to two-year colleges for reasons significantly different from those who have bachelor's degrees, as the former usually intend to fulfill degree requirements while the latter are looking for greater success in the labor market (Quinley & Quinley, 1999). Why do undergraduates leave four-year colleges and transfer to two-year institutions? Tinto (1987) suggests that a lack of academic and social integration may divert these students to community colleges. In this context, two-year colleges play the role of "salvation" for these students (Townsend, 2000). LeBard (1999) found that students with poor academic records or who were at high risk of academic dismissal often transferred to community colleges. Similarly, a recent study on reverse transfer between Illinois State University and Heartland Community College indicated that students left four-year colleges due to poor academic performance, poor interaction with faculty, feelings of being unprepared for a residential college, and limited use of student services (Lopez, 2002).

Other factors related to reverse transfer include socioeconomic status, educational expectations, part-time enrollment status, and a lack of satisfaction with the primary institution (McCormick & Carroll, 1997). Specifically, reverse transfer is "less common among both low- and high-SES [socioeconomic status] students than among middle socioeconomic status students; less common among students who expected to attain an advanced degree than among those who thought their highest degree would be a bachelor's; and less common among students who received financial aid than among unaided students" (McCormick & Carroll, 1997, p. 44). However, McCormick and Carroll's study does not provide a causal link between student characteristics and the probability of reverse transfer.

Certain characteristics of two-year colleges may also attract temporary reverse transfer students. Community colleges frequently offer lower tuition than four-year institutions, more convenient class locations and times, smaller classroom sizes, better job training opportunities, and a chance to improve one's grade point average (Kajstura & Keim, 1992; Winter & Harris, 2000). Students may also try to accelerate their progress toward a bachelor's degree by taking less expensive community college courses (Townsend, 2001b). For example, a study by the Oregon University System found that 1,100 students were concurrently enrolled in a four-year institution and a community college during the 1997-98 academic year. These students used two-year courses to supplement credits or coursework at four-year institutions, to enroll in developmental skill courses, to take prerequisite courses, or to complete a substantial proportion of major course requirements (Bach et al., 2000).

Unlike the majority of their undergraduate counterparts, post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students usually attend two-year colleges to acquire occupational training, upgrade skills, or finish a technical degree or certificate (Catanzaro, 1999; LeBard, 1999). Quinley and Quinley (1999) found that 10% of all post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students were interested in upgrading their skills for a current job and 56% wanted to start a new career. There was a gender difference in the selection of academic majors: most female students self-selected into allied health programs such as nursing, dental hygiene, and radiological technology, while male students preferred technology-related majors. In sum, depending on the type of reverse transfer student, reasons for reverse transferring can be negative (they are being pushed out of a four-year institution) or positive (they desire a new career).

Community College Motivations to Participate in Reverse Transfer

Community colleges have aggressively expanded their missions in the past decades with the idea that vertical expansions might improve their operational efficiency. Community colleges thus have multiple motivations for accepting reverse transfer students. First, recruiting and retaining reverse transfer students can enhance a college's vertical expansion efforts and can improve the diversity of its student body. Second, two-year colleges frequently take in academically under-performing four-year college students in order to provide them with a second chance to achieve a degree and to prevent them from dropping out of higher education (Townsend & Dever, 1999). Community colleges can also boost their enrollment with this group of students.

Accepting reverse transfer students may also increase the number of high-performing students in community college classrooms, a factor that may produce positive externalities for the entire student body. Although many undergraduate reverse transfer students performed relatively poorly in four-year colleges, Townsend (2000) found they were, on average, more academically able than first-time community college students and had a higher probability of persisting or transferring back to senior colleges. Therefore, reverse transfer students can serve as educational resources for other students. In sum, there are multiple incentives for community colleges to accommodate reverse transfer students. The following section hypothesizes the effects of reverse transfer on students and community colleges, using the efficiency-equity framework associated with multiple missions of two-year institutions.

Implications of Reverse Transfer on Efficiency and Equity in Community Colleges

Mission expansion might very well be an overlooked cause of reverse transfer. By working to diversify both their student body and the services they offer, community colleges generate a new demand for reverse transfer students. Thus from an organizational perspective, reverse transfer can be interpreted as a realization of two-year colleges' vertical mission expansion.

As different types of reverse transfer students enroll in various creditor non-credit programs, they influence community college efficiency and equity (see Table 1). Vertical expansion requires community colleges to build additional connections with four-year institutions, and thus enrolling reverse transfer students is a natural extension of existing partnerships between institutions. Undergraduate (URT) and temporary (TRT) reverse transfer students take advantage of such vertical mission expansion and gain access to the community college (Townsend & Dever, 1999). Post-graduate reverse transfer students (PRT-1) who enroll in degree programs also benefit from vertical expansion, as they can obtain additional degrees or certificates and use financial aid to cover some of their costs. Other post-graduate reverse transfer students (PRT-2), those who come to the community college for contract training, welfare-to-work programs, adult education projects, or skill upgrading and employment preparation, take part in horizontally--rather than vertically--expanded community college programs.

Based on this typology, it is possible to evaluate the efficiency and equity implications of reverse transfer. As part of vertical expansion, reverse transfer students in degree programs can improve community colleges' operational efficiency. These students (URT, TRT, and PRT1) may contribute to enrollment headcounts and require no additional services or costs. In addition, they may produce positive externalities for the rest of the student body. On average, they are more experienced and can act as role models and classroom facilitators for other community college students. Because reverse transfer students can provide teaching assistance at no cost to colleges, they could potentially reduce students' needs for college services. Their presence may, over time and with significant oversight, reduce a college's expenditures on remedial education, instructional support, and academic counseling. Unfortunately, except for a few studies of peer mentors at four-year colleges (Winston, 2003; Winston & Zimmerman, 2003), we do not know if or how much reverse transfer students might be able to help a community college lower its per-student cost.

Undergraduate and temporary reverse transfer students should have no effect on the equity of resource distribution in community colleges. Budget allocations are typically based on full-time-enrollment, and reverse transfer students generate the same amount of public subsidies as regular students. As well, because reverse transfer students frequently enroll in the same academic degree-granting programs as traditional students, cross-subsidization between programs is rarely necessary. However, vocational education is usually more expensive than academic programs (Grubb, 1999). If post-baccalaureate reverse transfers are concentrated in higher-cost vocational programs, they will receive more FTE funding than students in academic programs and thus might divert institutional resources. Post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students who enter continuing education or community-service programs, which are usually funded by employers or by the government, will not influence funding for traditional students.

In sum, reverse transfer is a current example of mission expansion in community colleges and one that has implications for efficiency and equality. Undergraduate and temporary reverse transfer students can potentially contribute to the operational efficiency of two-year institutions by strengthening core services in a way that does not affect resource distribution. On the other hand, post-baccalaureate students enrolling in high-cost vocational programs might crowd out other students and divert institutional resources from the colleges' core activities.

The Effects of Reverse Transfer Reverse transfer affects students and institutions differently. The following sections discuss the effects of reverse transfer on the students who engage in the practice, on other community college students, and on community colleges themselves.

Effects on Reverse Transfer Students

For undergraduate reverse transfer students, transfer to a community college creates a temporal interruption of the education process, and could have considerable effects on bachelor's degree attainment, time-to-degree, and cost of college attendance (Hilmer, 2000; Rab, 2004). Indeed, reverse transfer is associated with lower bachelor's degree attainment (McCormick, 2003; Peter & Cataldi, 2005). A national study using data from the Beginning Postsecondary Student Survey of 1989 (BPS:89) revealed that, on average, only 11.7% of undergraduate reverse transfer students achieved a bachelor's degree within 5 years compared to the 13.4% of students who began at a community college and transferred to either a four-year or less-than-four-year institution (McCormick, 2003). These results must be read with caution, however, as many reverse transfer students achieve alternative degrees (associate degrees or certificates), and they usually take a longer time to finish. Because bachelor's degree attainment rates will be lower than the total degree attainment rate, and because the eight-year bachelor's degree completion rate among transfer students (based on the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 [NELS:88]) is higher than the 5-year completion rate reported by BPS:89, the estimates may not capture all reverse transfer students who eventually attain the baccalaureate. Researchers should use a longer observation period and include all types of degrees and certificates to learn the true effect of reverse transfer on students who engage in it.

The effect of reverse transfer on time-to-degree varies across student groups. McCormick and Carroll (1997) reported that, on average, undergraduate reverse transfer students spent 12.5 months in their first institution and took 9.1 months off before enrolling in a second institution. This interruption leads to postponed degree completion. On the other hand, for temporary reverse transfer students who concurrently enroll at two- and four-year colleges during summer sessions, time-to-degree may be significantly shortened (Townsend, 2001a).

Reverse transfer may also create tuition savings. Because tuition is significantly lower at two-year colleges than at four-year institutions, undergraduate reverse transfer students lessen their financial burden by taking more courses at community colleges. Temporary reverse transfer students may also benefit financially by accelerating through degree requirements (Townsend, 2001a). As for post-baccalaureate students seeking skill upgrades, community colleges provide a cheaper alternative to for-profit institutions. For instance, community colleges provide contract training for employees at local businesses on the company's dime (Dougherty, 2002), allowing employees to upgrade their skills at low or no cost to themselves.

Effects on Other Two-Year Students

One of the central issues in estimating the effects of reverse transfer is estimating its effects on other two-year college students. Some studies show that post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students can facilitate learning for other students by increasing the quality of classroom interaction, assisting fellow students academically and socially, and helping faculty to improve teaching (Townsend & Lambert, 1999). No known study, however, has quantified this positive externality, and critics argue that temporary reverse transfer students are "taking over" academic courses and that post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students are "crowding out" traditional students from vocational programs (Townsend & Dever, 1999; Townsend & Lambert, 1999; Townsend, 2001b). Winter and Harris (2000) warned community college leaders that there were "opportunity costs associate[d] with college access" (p. 26) in terms of educational opportunity for low-income or minority high school graduates who have no other access to postsecondary education. Based on an investigation of 11 allied health programs in Colorado, McHugh (2003) demonstrated that in one nursing and two dental hygiene programs, students without bachelor's degrees were denied access due to competition from post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students, even though there were no observed differences--aside from educational background--in students' demographic and pre-admission profiles.

However, data supporting the "crowding out" theory is limited. If enrolling reverse transfer students enables community colleges to educate all students at similar or lower costs, equity of resource allocation remains intact. Indeed, there is no quantitative evidence that increasing the number of reverse students in core programs reduces the proportion of the traditional community college students in terminal or transfer programs. As well, post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students are usually not enrolled in core programs, and their education is frequently financed by alternative funding sources such as local employers and earmarked state funds. Thus, according to my model, post-baccalaureate students do not directly compete with traditional students for community college resources.

Effects on Community Colleges

From an organizational perspective, reverse transfer is related to the mission expansion of two-year colleges. In serving undergraduate reverse transfer students who plan to transfer back to a senior college, community colleges expand their transfer function (Townsend, 2000). By allowing four-year students concurrently to enroll in two-year programs, they strengthen their collegiate function. In addition, two-year institutions further their community education function by recruiting post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students (Quinley & Quinley, 1999). Furthermore, contract training projects and continuing education programs for workers with bachelor's degrees win critical economic and political support for community colleges from local communities (Dougherty, 2002). Nevertheless, it is unclear how much more efficient reverse transfer students will make the community college. As well, although the prior section suggests that reverse transfer students may reduce costs by generating positive peer effects, to date no researchers have compared the average and marginal costs of community colleges with high and low proportions of reverse transfer students.

Reverse transfer students may stimulate innovations as institutions must "develop new strategies for recruitment, academic support, and instruction. Growing recognition of this population Will also redefine the mission of community college to key constituency groups and the public" (Quinley & Quinley, 1999, p. 44). For example, several universities and community colleges in various regions collaboratively planned to develop policies to provide specific services for reverse transfer students (Bach, Banks, Kinnick, Ricks, & Stoering, 1999). Some universities and community colleges in Oregon had developed a proficiency-based admission standards system to provide more information to students. Because most post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students are highly focused on obtaining and upgrading skills, community colleges have become more specialized in designing and delivering education with near-term job applications (Winter & Harris, 2000). Despite these anecdotal and speculative positive outcomes, further research, perhaps utilizing an operational model, would be quite valuable.

Conclusion

By framing the reverse transfer phenomenon in relation to changing missions of the community college, several tentative conclusions can be drawn. First, reverse transfer is likely a result of mission expansion in two-year colleges. Second, reverse transfer may have positive effects for students and institutions. Institutions enrolling a large number of reverse transfer students may be able to increase their enrollment and improve the quality of classroom instruction. However, reverse transfer has varying effects on students' educational attainment, depending on the type of reverse transfer involved.

Are there positive peer effects as well as negative "crowding out" effects? The paucity of empirical evidence of either of these phenomena makes it impossible to assess these equity effects. According to my theoretical analysis, institutions may be able to improve efficiency by recruiting reverse transfer students. However, this hypothesis will need to be further tested with empirical data. Therefore, both the equity and efficiency effects of reverse transfer are open to further discussion.

Greater state and national data that provide more accurate estimates of reverse transfer will allow researchers to investigate how varying reverse transfer rates affect student retention, transfer, degree completion, and time-to-degree. It will also enable further studies of the institutional costs of reverse transfer. Future empirical analyses of the efficiency and equity effects of reverse transfer are critical for developing effective institutional interventions and will also help state policymakers to design more coordinated higher education systems that enhance student and institutional performance (Phelan, 1999).

References

Adelman, C., Daniel, B., & Berkovits, I. (2003). Postsecondary attainment, attendance, curriculum and performance: Selected results from the NELS:88/2000 Postsecondary Education Transcript Study (PETS), 2000 (NCES Report No. NCES2003-394). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics.

Bach, S. K., Banks, M., Kinnick, M. K., Ricks, M. F., & Stoering, J. M. (1999). Reverse transfer students in an urban postsecondary system in Oregon. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges, (pp. 47-56). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Bach, S. K., Banks, M. T., Kinnick, M. K., Ricks, M. F., Stoering, J. M., & Walleri, R. D. (2000). Student attendance patterns and performance in an urban postsecondary environment. Research in Higher Education, 41(3), 315-330.

Bailey, T. (2002). Community colleges in the 21st century: Challenges and opportunities. In P. A. Gram & N. Stacy (Eds.), The knowledge economy and postsecondary education: Report of a workshop (pp. 1-10). Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

Bailey, T., & Averianova, I. E. (1998). Multiple missions of community colleges: Conflicting or complementary ? New York: Columbia University Teachers College, Community College Research Center. Available from: http://ccrc.tc.columbia.edu/Publication.asp?UID = 17

Bailey, T., & Morest, V. S. (2004). The organizational efficiency of multiple missions for community colleges. New York: Columbia University, Teachers College, Community College Research Center. Available from http://ccrc.tc.columbia.edu/Publication.asp?UID = 7

Brint, T. R., & Karabel, J. B. (1989). The diverted dream: Community colleges and the promise of educational opportunity in America, 1900-1985. New York: Oxford University Press.

Catanzaro, J. L. (1999). Understanding and recruiting the reverse transfer students: A presidential perspective. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 27-34). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Dougherty, K. J. (2002). The evolving role of the community college: Policy issues and research questions. In J. C. Smart & W. G. Tierney (Eds.), Higher education: Handbook of theory and research, volume XVII (pp. 295-348). New York: Agathon Press.

Grubb, W. N. (1999). Honored but invisible: An inside look at teaching in community colleges. New York: Routledge.

Hilmer, M. J. (2000). Does the return to university quality differ for transfer students and direct attendees? Economics of Education Review, 19(1), 47-61.

Kajstura, A., & Keim, M. C. (1992). Reverse transfer students in Illinois community colleges. Community College Review, 20(2), 39-44.

LeBard, C. (1999). Sources and information on the scope and impact of reverse transfers. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 85-92). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Lopez, D., Jr. (2002). Understanding reverse transfer from the student's perspective: A case study of Illinois State University students who transfer to Heartland Community College and return to the university. Dissertation Abstracts International, 64(4), 1191. (UMI No. AAT 3088026)

McCormick, A. C. (2003). Swirling and double-dipping: New patterns of student attendance and their implications for higher education. In J. E. King, E. L. Anderson, & M. E. Corrigan (Eds.), Changing student attendance patterns: Challenges for policy and practice (pp. 13-24). New Directions for Higher Education, no. 121. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

McCormick, A. C., & Carroll, C. D. (1997). Transfer behavior among beginning postsecondary students: 1989-1994 (NCES Report No. NCES97-266). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics.

McHugh, E. J. (2003). Post-baccalaureate reverse transfer students and two-year restrictive access allied health program. Dissertation Abstracts International, 64(9), 3173. (UMI No. AAT 3107090)

Peter, K., & Cataldi, E. F. (2005). The road less traveled? Students who enrolled in multiple institutions (NCES Report No. NCES2005-157). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Educational Statistics.

Phelan, D. J. (1999). Institutional and public policy implications of the phenomenon of reverse transfer students. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 77-84). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Quinley, J. W., & Quinley, M. P. (1999). The urban postbaccalaureate reverse transfer student: Giving new meaning to the term second chance. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 35-46). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Rab, S. Y. (2004). Swirling students: Putting a new spin on college attrition. Dissertation Abstracts International, 65(3), 1127. (UMI No. AAT 3125888) Tinto, V. (1987). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Townsend, B. K. (1999). Editor's note. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 1-4). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Townsend, B. K. (2000). Rationals of community colleges for enrolling reverse transfer students: A second chance for whom? Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 24(4), 301-311.

Townsend, B. K. (2001a, November). Four-year college students' use of the community college. A middle-class takeover? Paper presented at the 26th annual conferences of the Association for the Study of Higher Education, Richmond, VA.

Townsend, B. K. (2001b). Redefining the community college transfer mission. Community College Review, 29(2), 29-42.

Townsend, B. K., & Dever, J. T. (1999). What do we know about reverse transfer students? In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 5-14). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Townsend, B. K., & Lambert, R. K (1999). Postbaccalaureate reverse transfer in Maryland and Tennessee: Institutional problems and possibilities. In B. Townsend (Ed.), Understanding the impact of reverse transfer students on community colleges (pp. 67-76). New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Winston, G. C. (2003). Toward a theory of tuition: Prices, peer wages, and competition in higher education. (Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education Discussion Paper No. 65). Williamstown, MA: Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education. Retrieved March 16, 2006, from http://www.williams.edu/wpehe/DPs/DP-65.pdf

Winston, G. C., & Zimmerman, D. J. (2003). Peer effects in higher education. (Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education Discussion Paper No. 64). Williamstown, MA: Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education. Retrieved March 16, 2006, from http://www.williams.edu/wpehe/ DPs/DP-64.pdf

Winter, P. A., & Harris, M. R. (2000). Community college reverse transfer students: A field survey of a nontraditional student group. Community College Review, 27(1), 13-28.

* This review is published in cooperation with the Community College Studies program in the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies. The review process for these articles is coordinated by UCLA.

Po Yang is a doctoral student at Teachers College, Columbia University, New York. [e-mail]

Table 1
Reverse Transfer, Mission Expansion, and Efficiency-Equity
Tradeoff

           Vertical or      Diversify      Diversify
           Horizontal        Student        Service
            Expansion         Body          Profile

URT         Vertical           Yes            No
TRT         Vertical           Yes            No
PRT-1       Vertical           Yes            No
PRT-2      Horizontal          No             Yes

             Improve         Reduce
           Efficiency        Equity

URT            Yes             No
TRT            Yes             No
PRT-1          Yes          Not sure
PRT-2       Not sure           No